Kakegurui – 09

Welp, guessed that match right. It may not have been the most exciting episode of Kakegurui this week, but the show still retains a good deal of surprises. Yumemi’s humility, Manyuda’s brazen attitude, hell even Yumeko’s cute surprise at being turned down. What lacked in gambling goodness was more than made up by the actions and personalities of the characters in play as we arguably received Kakegurui’s most “moral” episode to date. It’s not all fun and games under this hood.

While Yumeko’s victory was entirely expected (at least for me), Yumemi’s response was anything but. Honourably accepting the loss, enforcing the consequences, and making no attempt to paint over the details? Say what you want, but that takes balls. Yumemi is correct that the majority of the entertainment industry—especially Hollywood—is based on luck, but as her fans showed her, being “real” and revealing your true self can often be just as important. It was never about who Yumemi is, but what she represents. People love her as an idol, everything else besides that image is just gravy. Yumemi’s frustration and disgust? Part of the struggle of reaching the idol summit, something her fans understand and the very thing she misunderstood about them the most. I honestly expected myself to dislike Yumemi after this week, but her actions quickly eradicated that thought. This girl was antagonist done right.

Where this gets fun, however, is the follow up. I’m still not convinced Manyuda is the culprit behind the letter and recorder (because big mouth), but at this stage it does not matter. With Yumemi publically identifying Manyuda and Yumeko directly challenging him over the issue, the upcoming match, no matter what Manyuda wants, will be over his culpability. This is a match he must win, because losing ensures his goal of taking Kirari’s presidency goes the way of the dodo. It’s a little surprising Yumeko used her public match card for such a game, but it does make sense in a way. Much like Kirari is likely grooming Yumeko for their inevitable showdown, Yumeko is trying to encourage Kirari to come to her. What’s the point in forcing the President into a public match when you can simply get the President to offer you a match in order to stop beating on the Student Council? Crushing Manyuda is a good appetizer in Yumeko’s eyes, plus it also forces Kirari to consider her “worthy” by eliminating more of Kirari’s competition. There is a lot riding on the outcome of this match, and we don’t even know what both sides are betting yet.

With three episodes to go it’s safe to say the best games are yet to come. If Manyuda falls to the whirlwind of crazy only three Student Council members (well, two) remain unsullied, and you can bet it won’t remain that way for long. The only question left as we get down to brass tacks is whether the fated Kirari-Yumeko showdown will hit before the final credits roll.

I was rather disappointed that they skipped Yumeko’s singing. It wasn’t even that long of a song to adapt. It teased me with a little bit of her voice, and then they cut it off like “lolnope”. Well screw you too. -_-

Was also kind of disappointed that they didn’t adapt the part about what Yumemi’s mother told her when Yumemi was younger looking up to a celebrity in spotlight. Would have helped shown how understandable her strong determination in doing as much as she could in being one was, even to the point of being two-faced towards her fans.

Also a few other things they have skipped. Quite a good amount skipped overall. What was adapted was nice for the most part, but still. While I wasn’t expecting everything from the manga to be in there, it was still pretty noticeable amount skipped overall. If only this anime didn’t last for only 12 episodes… I bet another reason was due to animating the ED dance, which was actually pretty damn nice and enjoyable imo. Even the manga didn’t have this sort of thing. I think that sort of makes up for it :)

I really hope the next game will be adapted wonderfully, since it’s actually one of my favorites.

I have a feeling they left a lot of for blue-rays in this ep. Because while I can see the budget and time went to the ed song….I honestly would rather have the actual games adapted and the ed song to be part of the blue-ray. Because honestly saying that there’s an exclusive MV of both of the girls singing in a fully-animated scene would get more purchases for them. Horrible marketing on their part and the fact they felt the need to pander to the typical Japanese Otaku this ep.

Since its not exactly spoiler since the show decided to skip it, to anyone wondering. Yumemi’s mother straight up told her when she was little that she couldn’t go on the red carpet because she was Japanese, in probably in the most blunt way as possible. There’s truth to her words as Asians outside of the US rarely get seen on the red carpet as its usually Americans, some Europeans, and now starting to have actors/resses from Africa (though usually its only for a slavery movie), rarely anyone that isn’t Asian American is on there.